Education

2:30pm

Education

The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals says the 25 percent cap on private high school tuition that can be covered by merit-based scholarships will remain in place. The Kentucky High School Athletic Association sets regulations that all member high schools must comply with. When this regulation was set in 2007, the cap was meant to prevent schools from buying students to play for their school, said Commissioner Julian Tackett. Several private schools were involved in writing the regulation, he said.

11:46am

Education

Kentucky has been awarded $17 million in federal Race to the Top funding for public education. Kentucky originally requested $175 million from the U.S. Department of Education. Officials say while the $17 million award is substantially less, it’s still appreciated. Kentucky Department of Education spokeswoman Lisa Gross says some of the money will be used to expand Advance Kentucky, an initiative that works to increase high school students’ access to Advanced Placement courses.

9:42am

Education

Trigg County Public Schools recently opened an investigation into allegations that a primary school teacher punished an elementary student by putting the student in a trash can. Superintendent Travis Hamby said the district was in the process of gathering information about the alleged incident and couldn’t comment on what exactly occurred.

9:12am

Education

More than 63 percent of Kentucky’s public high school Class of 2010 has enrolled in college – the highest percentage on record, the state announced Thursday. Among the high school data in the report, Paintsville Independent High School had the highest college-going rate at 97.7 percent and Model Lab in Madison County had the second highest at 95.65. Five high schools had a 90 percent or higher college-going rate, while five had a rate of less than 40 percent.

1:10pm

Education

Officials with the Murray Independent School District and the Calloway County Schools say they are not happy with a 2 percent budget cut for the current school year and plans for an additional cut for 2012-13. Murray Superintendent Bob Rogers said he was notified by Kentucky Department of Education officials about a mid-year reduction in state funding of $157,294. In a release to superintendents across the state, KDE officials reported receiving notification from Mary E. Lassiter, state budget director, that a mid-year budget cut will be necessary.

12:57pm

Education

The University of Pikeville has 1,800 full- and part-time students enrolled this year. If the proposal to make the school one of Kentucky's eight public, four-year universities is approved, the school would deed its assets to the state.

Dori Hjalmarson/Lexington Herald-Leader

There is a move afoot to make the private University of Pikeville a state-supported school, and lawmakers could be asked to consider the proposal in the upcoming legislative session. It's been four decades since the legislature last took a private, four-year university — the University of Louisville — into the state's public higher-education system, so adding Pikeville is a significant public-policy issue. The idea raises concern among officials at other state universities that bringing Pikeville into the system could eat into their funding.

11:47am

Education

FRANKFORT — Todd County school officials appeared before Kentucky’s Joint Committee on Health and Welfare in Frankfort Monday to share their side of the Amy Dye story. Following the testimony of Patricia Wilson, who recently resigned as the commissioner of the Department for Community Based Services, Todd County Schools Superintendent Mike Kenner, Assistant Superintendent Vicki Myers and South Todd Elementary Principal Camille Dillingham addressed discrepancies in the cabinet’s previous statements to the same panel.

1:46pm

Education

Kentucky State University is well under way with a $100,000 grant to help first-generation college students succeed in school. KSU is one 18 schools sharing a $3 million grant from the Walmart Foundation awarded in February through the Alliance for Equity in Higher Education. Recipients are halfway through a two-year search for ways to keep low-income, minority and first-generation college students in school until graduation day.

1:16pm

Education

Marion County could be the home of two high schools next year. Superintendent Chuck Hamilton and the Marion County Board of Education began discussing the possibility of creating an A5 school in time for the 2012-13 school year during a school board meeting Tuesday of last week. Hamilton, who helped develop an A5 school while he was Mercer County's superintendent, said the school would allow students to earn their diploma, but also give them the flexibility to work.

12:59pm

Education

Three Eastern Kentucky counties that are among the poorest in the nation will benefit from a federal education grant of up to $30 million to Berea College. The college announced Tuesday it had won one of five grants awarded nationally under a U.S. Department of Education initiative aimed at improving education and students' development in poor areas. The money will be used for a range of services in Clay, Jackson and Owsley counties such as reading programs, after-school tutoring, arts and cultural offerings and expanded recreation.

3:17pm

Education

The Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) expects to hear this week whether the state will be awarded a Race to the Top consolation grant. KDE learned last week that it will not receive any of the $500 million of federal funding for early childhood education. Kentucky is now one of seven states, which have failed to win a grant in the first two phases that will potentially share some of the $200 million available in phase three, said Lisa Gross, spokeswoman with the Kentucky Department of Education.

2:36pm

Education

From left, University of Kentucky students Linsey Ward, Kate Topley, Matt Dement and Margo Cain, worked on an art project recently in a class taught by Marty Henton. The class, part of the UK Core program,is aimed at helping non-art students.

Charles Bertram/Lexington Herald-Leader

The students in Marty Henton's art class wear spattered smocks as they layer paint and stencil designs over their projects, but don't confuse them for virtuosos. "I'm not, like, an artist," said Bethany Brookover, a sophomore transfer from Cincinnati, as she mixed a gold glaze over her art project. "I've never even been to an art museum before." Given the choice, Brookover and most of her classmates might have kept it that way. But this class, Pathways to Creativity, is not an elective. It's a requirement, part of UK's new general-education-studies program, known as UK Core. The vast, multi-year undertaking has completely revamped undergraduate requirements in an effort to better prepare students for a different world than the one students faced in the 1980s, when the last general-education-studies plan was designed.

2:40pm

Education

In this editorial piece, Bob Lochte, chair of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications at Murray State University, expresses his concerns about the cost of a college education in Kentucky. "Simply put, we are pricing a university education out of the reach of many Kentucky high school graduates at precisely the time more of them are well-prepared to earn Bachelor’s and higher degrees. If this is happening at a relatively low-cost university such as Murray State, the problem looms larger elsewhere. We must do something about this or run the risk of frustrating the aims of more than two decades of education reform," Lochte writes.

4:03pm

Education

Hart County's school superintendent is arguing that a new test that Kentucky high school students will take for the first time next spring will treat evolution as fact, not theory, and will require schools to teach that way. Superintendent Ricky D. Line raised the issue in recent letters and email messages to state Education Commissioner Terry Holliday and Kentucky Board of Education members. Line wants them to reconsider the "Blueprint" for Kentucky's new end-of-course test in biology.

3:55pm

Education

Local school officials around Kentucky will soon find out how much money they stand to lose in a $57.5 million shortfall to state education funding. Education Commissioner Terry Holliday told superintendents in an email Friday that the Kentucky Department of Education would announce mid-year cuts later this month.

3:45pm

Education

University of Kentucky president Eli Capilouto told the UK Board of Trustees today that the university has launched negotiations with a Memphis-based company that could take over revitalization and expansion of the school's dorm operations. A Student Housing Developer Selection Committee has suggested that UK weigh the benefits of turning over the school's 6000-bed student housing system to a private company called Education Realty Trust. The announcement has raised a few eyebrows, including a few at the Wall Street Journal, which reported today that UK is one of the biggest schools in the country to consider privatizing its housing system and a successful move in that direction could spark a national trend.

3:44pm

Education

In addition to announcing he won't support state funding for Rupp Arena's renovation or replacement, University of Kentucky president Eli Capilouto also says he intends to hire professional consultants to examine questions of efficiency at UK.

5:12pm

Education

There is room to grow at Eastern Kentucky University’s Manchester campus. But school administrators in the southeast Kentucky town face questions of when and how to grow. Director of E-K-U’s Manchester campus, Terry Gray says about 300 students are currently enrolled in classes. “We could handle in terms of size and classroom seats...we could go from three to 12 hundred. Now to do that, it would be more than just working with our local community. We would have to work with our service region including Clay, Jackson, Bell, Owsley, Harlan, Perry,” said Gray.

12:23pm

Education

A new report on the condition of roughly a third of public school buildings in Kentucky estimates that total repair and improvement needs would cost $3.7 billion dollars. Department of Education spokeswoman Lisa Gross says evaluations were conducted at 477 buildings across the state.

2:30pm

Education

Jessamine County Schools Superintendent Lu Young was named the 2012 Kentucky School Superintendent of the Year on Wednesday by the Kentucky Association of School Administrators. Association Executive Director Wayne Young and other officials surprised Young with the award Wednesday afternoon at the Jessamine County Career and Technology Center. Young, 51, joined the Jessamine County Schools as a teacher in 1983. She became superintendent in 2004, and has been highly regarded among school superintendents statewide.

2:25pm

Education

Jessamine County Schools Superintendent Lu Young was named the 2012 Kentucky School Superintendent of the Year on Wednesday by the Kentucky Association of School Administrators. Association Executive Director Wayne Young and other officials surprised Young with the award Wednesday afternoon at the Jessamine County Career and Technology Center. Young, 51, joined the Jessamine County Schools as a teacher in 1983. She became superintendent in 2004, and has been highly regarded among school superintendents statewide.

2:56pm

Education

Lori Gooding worked with spina bifida patient Joshua Divens during a music therapy session at Kentucky Children's Hospital.

Julia MeadorUK Public Relations

A clinical music therapist at UK's Chandler Hospital is taking her expertise to the classroom with the launch of a new graduate program. Dr. Lori Gooding uses singing and her guitar to help her patients reduce pain and anxiety.

7:54pm

Education

A 20-page document with guidelines for closing achievement gaps in public schools was released this week by the Kentucky Department of Education. "Guidelines for Closing the Gaps for All Students" was authored by the Commissioner's Raising Achievement/Closing Gaps Council, a group of 28 people representing schools, agencies and communities across the Commonwealth with an interest in equity and diversity issues.

2:43pm

Education

Three days after he was arrested on charges of driving under the influence of alcohol/drugs and resisting arrest, David Young has resigned as superintendent of Laurel County Schools. At a special called meeting Tuesday morning, the Laurel County Board of Education met in executive session after which it was announced that Young had tendered his resignation. The board named Deputy Superintendent Denise Grieble as the interim superintendent.

2:41pm

Education

Since June, the Mason County School District has been under investigation by the Office of Education Accountability in Frankfort. The OEA was created by the Kentucky General Assembly to investigate complaints against Kentucky school districts and is a separate entity from the Department of Education. According to Karen Timmel, division manager of investigations at OEA, the agency's primary charge is to investigate violations of the Kentucky Education Reform Act, however, if during an investigation other issues outside the realm of KERA are uncovered, OEA refers those activities elsewhere.

10:06am

Education

The South may help explain the shift toward college-and-career readiness in education, according to Education Week Editor Virginia Edwards. Edwards will be in Kentucky Friday to speak at the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence fall meeting. She previously worked at the Courier-Journal for several years and this will be the second time she’s addressed the education advocacy organization.

11:05am

Education

Personal phone calls and text messages are no longer allowed during class time for Frankfort Independent teachers and staff. Board of Education members gave final approval to a new policy Tuesday, banning personal cell phone use by employees during class time. Calls and texts must now wait for planning periods, lunch breaks or before or after school, according to the new rules.

10:55am

Education

Union College president Ed deRosset announced Monday that he will officially retire as the college's president at the end of December, 18 months ahead of a planned retirement date of 2013 set earlier this year.